The Blood that Binds Us
by Corsair
Summary: A lone Mercenary unit stumbles up on a secreat force hidden with in the Inner Sphere and only they can stop it. My first serious BT fic, please read and review!


Disclaimer: I do not own Battletech or Mechwarrior and I do not pretend to do so. All copywrited material in this document and any related documents belong to their respective owners.  
  
The Blood that Binds Us Prologue: The Path of a Childs Memory  
  
Sometime in a long distant past Somewhere in a memory  
  
The huge door opened before the small child and he was frightened. He was only five and had never seen such a massive thing before and as it moved it groaned on its hinges, like some fairytale monster. That monster seemed to roar and open its mouth wide to consume him and he hid behind the leg of the man that stood next to and towered over him. The man looked down at the boy and smiled through his beard. He never found amusement in another persons fear, and that didn't change for this situation, but he did find the reason for the boys fear amusing. He could see why that he would be frightened of the groaning door; he had been up half the night the evening before because of the fear of a monster under his bed, the idea planted in his mind by an older child trying to scare him. Now the man patted the boys head gently to reassure him that he had nothing to fear and the child seemed a little reassured that he was in no true danger, but still moved out from behind the protection of the leg very carefully just in case the door turned out to be a monster and have it lunge to devour him.  
  
"Come now Vincent, do you think I would let any big, scary monsters eat you?" the man said to the boy, Vincent, with a big grin.  
  
"No." Vincent said, trying to sound brave to his father, but his father could hear the tremor of fear in his voice. He had been a soldier far to long and heard that same tremor in the voice of soldiers old and young not to notice it.  
  
"Lets go then. Your mother is waiting."  
  
Vincent's father offered his hand to his youngest son and the child took his hand and the strength behind his fathers grip seemed to vanquish his fear. They walked towards the maw that had been uncovered by the doors opening and Vincent still clung close to his father for protection. He didn't want to go into the massive bay that he was leading him into, but he also wanted to be brave for his father and forced himself to keep going. He suppressed the urge to chuckle at the bravery his son was showing, he could feel the small hand trembling in his own.  
  
The bay was dark compared to the bright day outside and the boy suddenly forgot his fear as he looked around in wonder at what he saw. Lining the walls were large alcoves built to service and maintain the metal giants that stood in them. Crawling all over these giants were techs looking for any sort of damage or sign of strain and repairing what damage they did find and also making sure everything was in working order. The boy was awed at this hive of activity, the massive objects that were taking all the attention had only been known to him from stories told by his parents and in his imagination. They were all different, some were big, others were small, some were bulky, others skinny. Some looked like giant metal men, were as others had bird like legs the bent backwards at the knee and resembled nothing looking like a human.  
  
Finally they stopped, at the back of the bay, facing one of the alcoves where a metal giant stood; it to was being serviced by maintenance personnel, but this one was different from the others, it was bigger and was greatly taller. It had board shoulders and chest, its arms and legs with thick with armour and its head had been shaped to resemble a human skull and Vincent's fear returned looking up at it. To him it was worse then the monster that he had thought was hiding under his bed. He could see this monster and gaze up at its ugly face. Its body was painted a dark shade of blue and a bright white, but in places there were round openings, maws of the weapons that were packed inside of the great machine.  
  
Vincent began to wonder why his father had lied to him. He had said that he would never let any monsters hurt him, so why had he brought him here to see this monster that definitely looked like it wanted to hurt him? Someone started to yell and Vincent looked around. He knew the voice and he spotted its owner, a small but strong looking woman sat on the shoulder of the giant, a smoking cigar was clenched between her teeth. She had black hair that reached her shoulders, a round face with a small nose and fiery brown eyes. Vincent was calmed at the sight of the woman. Even if his father was willing to deliver him into the den of a monster seeking a snack, he knew that his mother would fight that monster tooth and nail to protect him. She waved at him and his father when she saw them.  
  
She climbed down to the bays floor and put out her cigar beneath her boot heel and trotted over to them. Even though she was in her early thirties she still had the energy of a girl half her age and her lips become a broad smile as she crossed the distance to her youngest boy and husband. It had been sometime since she had last seen them and she made no attempt to hide her joy at the sight of them. She embraced her husband firmly and they exchanged a kiss, then she knelt to face Vincent and she hugged him tightly in the way that all mothers do. She held him out slightly and kissed him on the check.  
  
"How has my boy been?"  
  
"Really good mommy! My teacher says that I'm really getting better at my spelling!"  
  
"That's good." She looked up at the giant she had just come down off of. "What do you think of it?"  
  
"It's kind of scary, but I'm not afraid!" She smiled at him.  
  
"Yup, he's been real brave." Vincent's father said patting his son on the head again. "She looks kind of battered. That little trouble you ran into on Wei must have been worse then the reports said." "Yeah. The terrorists were better equipped then we thought. Turned out they were in fact a bunch of Liao regulars trapped there during the Fourth War." Vincent's mother looked sad for a moment. "We lost a lot of good people in that ambush and I think some of our wounded will never seen combat again."  
  
Vincent had know idea what his parents were talking about he just looked up at the machine then at his father.  
  
"That's a battlemech daddy?" He said pointing at it.  
  
"Sure is, Vincent. That ones called an Atlas."  
  
"Can I drive one when I grew up?"  
  
"Yup. But you'll have plenty of time to figure that out." 


End file.
